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I have noticed that whenever I just execute the command bash in Terminal that it appears to have executed successfully with no output.

I have also noticed that then when I want to close Terminal I get this:

Process still running

So by executing the command bash I am starting a new process? What does this command by itself do then?

I am running Ubuntu 14.10.

2 Answers 2

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bash ("Bourne Again Shell") displays the command line and runs whatever you type there.

By default Terminal starts bash so it's what you see there if you just open a Terminal.

If you tell bash to start another bash the new one will by default just look like the old one so it looks like the command has been executed successfully with no output, but it's still running.

You can use the command

echo $$

to display the process ID (PID) of the currently running bash and exit it with

exit

or Ctrl+d

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When you execute bash, bash itself is a process and so the terminal warns you that closing the session will kill that process. Even if that process isn't doing anything, it's still running.

If you execute exit it will end that bash session and the terminal won't warn you again.

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